CHILDREN in one of London’s poorest boroughs, Tower Hamlets – are amongst the fattest in the country.

ONE in four 10-11 year-olds in Tower Hamlet’s are reported to be obese.

According to a report by the Greater London Authority, (GLA), over a third of London’s 11 year-olds in total are overweight and one in five are obese, making children in London heavier than those in other parts of England.

‘Modern diet is cheap, and heavily promoted’

The link between deprivation and obesity means that people in poorer areas have a higher risk of developing chronic illnesses due to poor diet and lifestyle choices.

One of the UK’s most well-known experts in obesity and weight loss, Dr Ian Campbell, believes that 30% of cancer cases, with more than half of the cases of type 2 diabetes sufferers are directly caused by these bad choices.

“There is an increasing awareness of the benefits of clean foods. But the modern diet is cheap, and heavily promoted so it seems unlikely that will change significantly in the near future. Sad, but true. Also, the ‘pharma’ industry reacts to market opportunity; they’re not a philanthropic movement. Where an opportunity doesn’t exist, they work hard to create one, ” he said.

‘Benefits massively’

The pharmaceutical industry is benefitting from the obesity epidemic. Novo Nordisk, which manufactures half of the world’s diabetes medicines and products had a 10% increase in its operating profit in the first nine months of 2013.

‘Cleverly covered up’

Health nutritionist, Yvonne Wake, is “convinced” that the adoption of a modern diet that contain constant intakes of processed, micro-waved and fast-foods, is the direct cause of the wide-spread prevalence of systematic degenerative diseases in western cultures. She also believes that the pharmaceutical industry gains “massively” from all of these illnesses.

“It’s all very cleverly covered up though and probably difficult to prove, except for the fact that company’s like Coca Cola and MacDonald’s are normally sponsors of studies and trials that test these pharmaceuticals,” she said.

Industries that profit from obesity in general are growing. With the addition of more than 21,300 Macdonald’s stores worldwide since 1992 – it doesn’t look like we’ll be getting any thinner.

The McDonald's business model is dependent on a populace that is fascistically conformist.